Several weeks ago, a group of 10 aldermen decided to try to help two education-reform groups — Raise Your Hand and Communities Organized for Democracy in Education — that are gathering signatures to put an advisory referendum measure on the November ballot asking Chicago voters if they’d prefer to have an elected school board rather than a school board handpicked by the mayor.

A vote for such a change — no matter how symbolic — would be a repudiation of Emanuel's leadership of the schools.

To get around the signature requirement and simply place the question on the ballot in their wards, the 10 aldermen needed the pro-forma OK of the City Council. But time was short, several deadlines had passed, so they pinned their last hopes on Moore (right), chair of the Human Relations Committee.

Moore, who is not part of the group of 10 but has long been seen as a populist willing to fight the good fight, said he “readily agreed” to amend his committee meeting agenda for Monday, July 23, to allow for expedited consideration of these referendum requests.

But he told his colleagues to be sure their paperwork was in by 10 a.m. on Thursday, July 19 — four full days before the committee meeting.

Why so far in advance? We’ll get to that in a moment.

A leader of the group, Ald. John Arena, 45th, said he was at Moore’s office, papers in hand, at 9:45 a.m. that Thursday morning. Moore said it could have been as late at 9:50 a.m.

Anyway, for reasons Arena said are unclear to him, Moore’s assistant began retyping and photocopying the submissions. So by the time the documents were submitted and time-stamped at the city clerk’s office, it was 10:03 a.m., 95 hours and 57 minutes prior to the meeting.

Both the Illinois Open Meetings Act and the City Council’s Rules of Order and Procedure call for only a 48-hour prior public notice on such agenda changes (see below for citations). But Moore, to the surprise and disappointment of many, ruled at the Monday meeting that the clock stops on weekends, so the referendum submissions had been submitted only 47 hours and 57 minutes in advance of the meeting, three minutes late, and therefore he would not consider them.

Neither the Open Meetings law nor the rules specify that the 48-hour clock run only on “business days,” and in the only remotely similar passage in the rules, the word “day” specifically excludes Sundays and holidays but not Saturdays. And anyway, all such postings are available to the public 24/7 online.

Nevertheless, in an excess of caution, the city’s legal department has advised committee chairs not to include weekends when setting 48-hour advance deadlines, according to spokesman Roderick Drew. At the same time, Drew said, deputy corporation counsel Jeffrey Levine has concluded that being three minutes late was not a legitimate reason for Moore to block consideration of the referendum measures.

So why’d he do it? Why did erstwhile Champion of the People Joe Moore take an extremely generous interpretation of the meaning of “48 hours,” tie it to an extremely stingy interpretation of the deadline and kill a measure designed to promote democracy and accountability in government?

After all, even those of us on the fence or even highly doubtful about an elected school board for Chicago ought to be OK with letting the voters have their say, right?

Moore’s explanation — that to have let the three minutes slide would have been “to undermine the very integrity of the open government rules” — beggars belief. Neither the rules nor the law nor state Appellate Court precedent forwarded by the Illinois attorney general’s office nor common sense itself required him to interpret “48 hours” as “two business days.”

And, in fact, he acknowledged as much when he told me, “I have the complete discretion to interpret the Open Meetings Act requirements broadly.”

Other explanations — that Moore now sees a brighter future in cozying up to power rather than fighting it — make more sense.

Either way, in that one magical moment, Moore made more than those referendum proposals and those 48 hours disappear. His reputation as a reformer went poof! as well

----

RESOURCES:

Ald. Joe Moore responded to concern from his constitutents about the abolve matter by releasing the following statement:

A successful democracy requires transparency. There is a reason that we have rules in place requiring adequate notice for meetings so that the public knows what their government is doing. The Open Meetings Act requires a committee to post its agenda at least 48 hours in advance of a meeting, so that the public is given fair notice of the meetings of public bodies and the matters that will be considered at those meetings.

When my colleagues asked me to amend my meeting agenda to include a direct introduction of the advisory referendums, I readily agreed, but I cautioned them to be aware of the process that was entailed. After days passed and I hadn't heard from them, I contacted one of the leading aldermanic proponents the afternoon before the filing deadline and advised him of the approaching deadline. He assured me he would meet the deadline, and I instructed my staff assistant to arrive at City Hall early the next day so that she would be available to help him file the necessary paperwork. Unfortunately, he arrived too late to meet the filing deadline, despite my staff assistant's efforts to help him make the deadline. If I wanted to kill the measure, I certainly wouldn't have reminded my colleague of the notice deadline. That he didn't make the deadline is not my fault, it's his fault.

The 48-hour notice rule is not a suggestion. It's a mandate. It's there to protect open and transparent government which is fundamental to a functioning democracy. The law does not provide a fudge factor. It doesn't say, the committee shall undertake it's best efforts to provide notice, or do the best it can. The 48 hour rule is a mandate, which I take very seriously. I cannot play favorites by ignoring the notice rules for one group simply because they have noble intentions. To do so would be to undermine the very integrity of the open government rules and I'm not prepared to do that.

Yes, three minutes is "cutting it close," but what if the next time the notice deadline is missed by five minutes or 10 minutes or 30 minutes or three hours or one day? Where do you draw the line? I think it's far better to be fair and consistent across the board.

Other avenues are available to submit advisory referendums to the voters. Citizens can submit petitions for advisory referendums in their ward or precinct. But they have to submit them by the deadline. If you're even one minute late, the Board of Elections won't accept the petitions. The same rule applies to candidates filing their nominating petitions. It's a fair and even handed way to avoid playing favorites. Isn't that what democracy should be about?

His office sent me the above statement when I inquired after this issue . and I responded to his spokesman:

I don't understand the calculation of the deadline. Rules require 48 hour notice -- not two days, not two business days --- indeed a close reading of the council rules .pdf (see excerpts below) finds only one mention of days and deadlines and it excludes only Sunday and holidays in the count.

Thursday at 10:03 a.m. is 97 hours and 57 minutes prior to Monday at 10 a.m.. subtract for Sunday and you're still at 71 hours and 57 minutes. In what universe are these time spans less than 48 hours?

Finally, there is the issue of when Ald. Arena was at your office. He and Ald. Sawyer tell me it was from 10 to 15 minutes before 10 a.m. on that Thursday. They say that your staff person did some retyping and feinted at photocopying, which explains why the filing didn't get to the clerk's office until a bit past 10.

And of course beyond that is the peculiar precision invoked when we all know that it's common in legislative matters to be somewhat generous, shall we say, about the clock. The White Sox are in Chicago today, as Ald. Moore surely remembers, because the minute hand was stopped in Springfield while the legislators dickered over stadium funding.

I'm told by Arena that he checked with legal staff at the city and they indicated there really wouldn't have been a problem or a legal challenge to the timing here. I'm agnostic on the question of elected school boards, but very, very skeptical about the process here.

Note that I did check later with the Corporation Counsel's office and a spokesman confirmed that the three minutes would not have been an issue on which a successful challenge couild have been mounted.

Moore replied to me:

Thanks for giving me an opportunity to clarify any confusion you may have. To answer your first question, the Corporation Counsel has always interpreted the 48-hour rule to mean 48 business hours. To interpret it otherwise would lead to the incongruous result that you could post in City Hall at 4:59 p.m., Friday, a notice for a 9:00 a.m., Monday, meeting, thereby depriving the public of any effective notice at all.

With regard to when Alderman Arena was in my office, it's true he arrived at my office somewhere between 10 to 15 minutes before 10 a.m. (after being forewarned of the notice requirement for at least a week and reminded the day before).

However, my office is not the official venue for filing meeting agenda notices; it's the City Clerk's office. Though my staff assistant and I had a general idea of what the alderman intended to file, we did not have the specific language of the resolutions, nor a list of the wards where the advisory referendums were to held.

Once my staff assistant received the resolutions and the suggested language for the notice, she performed a yeoman's task of typing the notice, making the requisite number of photocopies required for filing and literally running down the stairs to the City Clerk's office. John Arena ran with her, so for him to say she "dilly dallied," is a blatant falsehood and a diversion from his own inability to get his act together.

I'd like to note for the record that Alderman Sawyer was not present at the time, so his account is based entirely on John Arena's version of the facts.

Of course Arena and Sawyer are suggesting I was doing the Mayor's bidding by refusing to accept direct introduction of the resolutions into my committee. If that were the case, why did I agree a week earlier to accept the resolutions? It's no secret the idea of an elected school board is an anathema to the Mayor. Why did I remind Arena the day before that the notice was due and he needed to get the resolutions and language to my office?

Why did I send my staff person down to my City Hall office at 8:30 in the morning to await his arrival? The fact is I did everything short of drafting the notice and resolutions myself, and he blew it, but I got the blow-back. As they say, no good deed goes unpunished.

Finally, you should note that introduction of a proposed ordinance or resolution directly into committee is not a matter of right. Rule 41 of the City Council Rules of Order and Procedure sets forth the normal procedure, which is introduction at a City Council meeting and referral to the appropriate subject matter committee.

Though Rule 41 goes on to provide that nothing in the rules "shall preclude" the introduction of legislation directly into a committee "by an operating department, office or agency in order to facilitate an expeditious hearing on said matter or where an emergency exists," it is not a mandate. And traditionally in the City Council committee chairmen have been given sole discretion as to whether to allow direct introduction of a piece of legislation into their committee.

99.99% of all legislation considered by the City Council is first introduced through the City Council itself, not a committee, and it is by far the preferred course. The good government reason for this is that it allows legislation to be more easily tracked by the public. The City Council Journal of Proceedings provides a written notice and record of every matter introduced into the City Council and the committee to which it is referred. When a matter is introduced directly into committee, the only notice of the legislation the public receives is the Committee agenda, which must be posted within 48 hours of the committee meeting.

So even in the unlikely event my interpretation of the notice requirement is somehow faulty, I'm the chairman of the Committee and have the complete discretion to interpret the Open Meetings Act requirements broadly and err on the side of openness and transparency.

One more thing. With regard to your White Sox reference, certainly you're not suggesting that "stopping the clock" is the preferred method of dealing with legal deadlines.

I must admit, I'm somewhat disappointed, if not surprised, in some of the so-called progressives who preach strict adherence to standards of openness, notice, transparency and fairness, but suddenly decry those standards as mere technicalities when it's their ox getting gored

I replied:

Can you cite some authority for your view that the Corporation Counsel has always interpreted 48 hours as being two business days? I see that as at the very least a highly debatable proposition -- the rules say 48 hours, not two days, not two days excluding weekends and holidays. Likewise the Open Meetings Act which you cited in your message to constituents. I can't find any authority that says the law ACTUALLY means two business days, and indeed anyone who would have challenged a simple 48-hour interpretation would have been hard pressed, far as I can tell, to locate legal precedent supporting this.

What about the Friday, 5 p.m. stealth filing? I guess one would have to take that hypothetical up with those who wrote the law, but that's not at all the situation here. In fact, as I read this, even giving you the Saturdays-don't-count rule, which, again, strikes me as whimsical, everything would still be fine if the Tuesday meeting gaveled open at 10:04 a.m....or was in fact postponed by five minutes for that purpose.

I anticipate your "what about10 minutes, what about 20 minutes, what about...?" etc. objection and reply that, yes, if there were anything stealthy or covert about this effort; if, in fact, this effort weren't exactly ABOUT giving the public a voice in the matter of school boards; weren't ABOUT trying to democratize the undemocratic situation of having an unelected school board (that would raise concerns).

Why did you choose to exercise a hyper-literal reading of the rules on a measure that you invited into your committee? I have no idea. You've certainly heard from many people who think they DO have an idea, and your explanation to them (and to me) why you didn't err on the side of democracy instead of on the side of hyper-literalism that happens to favor the mayor's position simply doesn't make sense.

Can you cite me authority on this 48-hour interpretation that gave you no other choice?

Note that I sent this response before I got confirmation from the Corporation Counsel's office that the law department does routinely advise committee chairs to not include weekend days in their 48-hour counts. Though that confirmation contained no particular legal reasoning.

Moore responded:

My authority for interpreting the 48 hour rule to be two business days is Assistant Corporation Counsel Jeff Levine, who is the Law Department's liaison to the City Council. He told me this on Wednesday, July 18th, in response to my inquiry about the procedures for a direct introduction into committee, which is why I told Alderman Arena he needed to get me the paperwork first thing Thursday morning.

Since you're asking me a bunch of hypothetical questions, why don't you ask Alderman Arena and the others why they simply didn't submit the resolutions to the City Council at its June meeting? If they had followed the normal course of procedures, they wouldn't have needed to come to me and ask for a direct introduction into my committee, which doesn't even have jurisdiction over education and election issues. Or ask him why he couldn't get his act together and get the paperwork to my assistant first thing Thursday morning, as I instructed and to which he agreed.

As I stated before, I told Arena and the others a week and a half prior to my scheduled meeting that I would accept a direct introduction. I cautioned them, however, to research the rules for direct introduction. When it was clear they weren't doing their homework, I researched the rules for them and told them what they needed to do and they still didn't do it.

If you're a candidate for office and you file your nominating petitions one minute late, you're not on the ballot, even if you spent months collecting thousands of signatures. Is that a "hyper-literal" application of the rules? Perhaps. But that's the way the law operates. A smooth functioning democracy requires an agreed-upon set of rules of procedure that are applied equally and fairly across the board. The moment you start cutting someone slack is the moment the rules begin to lose their meaning. Fair and consistent application of rules avoids the potential for favoritism down the road.

We can continue to argue back and forth about this, but the bottom line is this. As chairman of the committee, I have the complete discretion to interpret the Open Meetings Act requirements broadly. Based on my conversation with the assistant corporation counsel, I interpreted the 48-hour rule to be two business days. I told Arena those ground rules in advance. He didn't object to them until he blew the deadline.

Those aldermen who want to get the advisory measure on the ballot in their wards still have an opportunity to do so through citizen initiative. As I understand it, they are required to collect signatures of registered voters in a number equal to at least eight percent of the number of votes cast in the last election. Hardly an insurmountable obstacle for any ward organization worth its salt. But they better make sure they file their petitions by 5 p.m. on the day they're due. If they're one minute late, they're out of luck.

I replied:

At once you say " As chairman of the committee, I have the complete discretion to interpret the Open Meetings Act requirements broadly" and that you had no choice but to heed the strict time limit as as it was interpreted for you by the Corp. Counsel.

Which is it? Complete discretion or no choice?

As I'm sure you know, critics are saying that you've been cozying up to Mayor Emanuel; our story on this (controversy) said

For two decades, Far North Side Ald. Joe Moore railed against the city's political system, especially at the guy who oc-cupied the mayor's office. On Monday, the 49th Ward alderman found himself taking flak from some of his City Council colleagues for what they said was bow-ing to the will of Mayor Rahm Emanuel....

During former Mayor Richard Daley's two decades in office, Moore was his most outspoken council critic. Under Emanuel, who engineered Moore's appointment as a committee chairman, Moore has not op-posed a single major mayoral initiative.

Is this true? Or have you opposed major mayoral initiatives from Emanuel's office?

Moore replied:

My understanding of the Open Meetings Act notice requirement is that I had no choice. I just wanted to point out as an alternative argument that it was within my discretion, as chairman, to deny a direct introduction even if my understanding of the law was in error.

The media in Chicago has been reporting City Hall news using the same Independent vs. Machine paradigm for the last 60 years. This one dimensional coverage ignores the fact that the Democratic Machine as we once knew it (an organization fueled by political patronage) no longer exists and hasn't really existed for quite some time. But unfortunately rather than report on the nuances, the media tends to fall back on the old bromides. The Tribune story which you site is an example of that.

Look, I never opposed Daley just for the sake of opposing him, and I supported him on a lot of initiatives over the 20 years we served together. I've always approached each issue on its merits. A blind vote of opposition is just as thoughtless as a blind vote in support.

In his first year in office, I've supported Emanuel's initiatives because I've agreed with the final product. And when I thought he was wrong, he's listened to me and altered his position to address my concerns.

Both the parade ordinance and the Infrastructure Trust are prime examples of that. I was strongly leaning against supporting him on both those initiatives, but after conversations with me (and I'm sure others) he made changes to his original proposals that addressed the vast majority of my concerns. I would be happy to expound on those concessions if you'd like, but in the meantime feel free to read the following statements I issued on on both measures that outlined my reasons for supporting them.

(5 ILCS 120/2.02) (from Ch. 102, par. 42.02) Sec. 2.02. Public notice of all meetings, whether open or closed to the pub-lic, shall be given as follows: (a) Every public body shall give public notice of the schedule of regular meetings at the beginning of each calendar or fiscal year and shall state the regular dates, times, and places of such meetings. An agenda for each regular meeting shall be posted at the principal office of the public body and at the location where the meeting is to be held at least 48 hours in advance of the holding of the meeting...... Public notice of any special meeting except a meeting held in the event of a bona fide emergency, or of any rescheduled regular meeting, or of any reconvened meeting, shall be given at least 48 hours be-fore such meeting..... The requirement of public notice of reconvened meetings does not apply to any case where the meeting was open to the public and (1) it is to be reconvened within 24 hours, or .....

Nothing in the wording of this law would seem to refer to Sundays, holidays or other non-business days that would in effect stop the clock on the 48 hours or the 24 hours.

Rule 39: Except in cases of emergency, not less than three (3) days, exclusive of Sundays and holidays, shall intervene between the issuance of a call for a committee meeting and the date set in the call for that meeting, and each member shall attend promptly at the hour stated in the notice.

Rule 41: Whenever any referred matter shall not have been reported back to the City Council by the committee to which referred, within a period of thirty (30) days from the date of referral, the chairman of the committee shall at the written request of the sponsor submit a report in writing to the Council at its next regular meeting...Whenever any referred matter shall not have been reported back to the City Council by the committee to which referred, within a period of sixty (60) days from the date of referral, any Alderman may move to discharge the committee from further consideration of that matter.

Rule 52: The City Clerk shall cause the Rules of Order and Procedure for Years 2011 --2015 adopted by the City Council to be published on a website owned by the City of Chicago, and printed in a separate pamphlet for distribution to members of the City Council and the general public, no later than 60 days after these Rules have been adopted.

The concept of "hours" appears in two Council rules, the relevant portions are:

Rule 40: Notice of all committee meetings .....shall be prepared and distributed to all Aldermen by the Chairman not less than forty-eight hours prior to the meeting....

Rule 41: No deferred matter, whether deferred pursuant to these rules or pursuant to statute, may þe called for a vote unless written notice, identifying each matter to be called for a vote, is delivered to, and time stamped by, the City Clerk and copies delivered to all Aldermen at least forty-eight (48) hours in advance of the City Council meeting.

When I asked a spokeswoman at the Illinois Attorney General's office if there were any relevant precedents, she forwarded the December, 2009 Second District Appellate Court of Illinois decision in Foxfield Subdivision, v. The Village of Campton Hills (.rtf), the relevant portion of which reads:

Sections 2.02(a) and (b) (5 ILCS 120/2.02(a), (b) (West 2008)) require that an agenda for a special meeting be posted at least 48 hours in advance of the meeting, at “the principal office of the body holding the meeting” or, if no such office exists, at “the building in which the meeting is to be held.

Although no Illinois court has dealt with this exact issue, we find instructive the Texas cases cited by the Village. The ***517 **1107 Texas Open Meetings Act requires that notices be posted “on a bulletin board located at a place convenient to the public.” Texas Gov't Code Ann. § 551.0411(b) (Vernon). Texas courts have held that posting an agenda within a government building that is locked during nonbusiness hours does not violate the letter or spirit of their Act. For example, in City of San Antonio v. Fourth Court of Appeals, 820 S.W.2d 762, 768 (Tex.1991), the court held that, although the notice “was not continuously available” because one of the notices was posted on a bulletin board inside City Hall, which was locked during nonbusiness hours, “[m]any, if not most, cities are ill able to afford the additional security and utility costs which an 'open door' policy for the nocturnally curious would require.” In *994Lipscomb Independent School District v. County School Trustees of Lipscomb County, 498 S.W.2d 364, 366 (Tex.Civ.App.1973), the notice, which on a Friday was posted on a bulletin board inside the county courthouse and which recited that a meeting of the county board would be held on the following Tuesday, was held to be proper. The court held that, although the courthouse assertedly was locked on Friday and remained closed on the weekend, the notice did not violate the Texas Open Meetings Act because the law made “no requirement that such notice be accessible to the public at all times.”Lipscomb Independent School District, 498 S.W.2d at 366.

[5] Based on a plain reading of our Open Meetings Act, it is clear that the legislature does not require that an agenda be posted in a specific place so that it is publicly accessible for 48 continuous hours before the meeting. Section 2.02 requires simply that the agenda be posted 48 hours before the meeting, at the public body's principal office or at the building where the meeting will be held. Under the facts here, posting the agenda on Monday and Tuesday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. during Village Hall business hours certainly passes muster. Petitioners do not dispute that the notice was posted and accessible to members of the public both at the Village Hall and also at the Community Center, where the meeting was held, 48 hours before the meeting. Accordingly, we find no violation.

Posted at 12:25:00 AM

Comments

You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

Ok, but, to get back to your fourth paragraph, supporters still have time to circulate petitions and file those? Or has that deadline passed, also?

Mr. Anon - no, he's not. Eric specifically stated that he's agnostic on that issue. The issue in the column is the seemingly arbitrary definition of "48" hours that Moore is invoking and the fact that the appearance at least is that he's doing it to suck up to Emanuel. The issue is process, not content.

Sometimes minutes count. Once I was on a village board and we were bidding out a $300,000 highway project.. Deadline for bids was 7 pm. We opened the meeting, and one of the contractors came in at 7:02, apologizing rather casually for being late because of a flat tire and handing in his bid. Our supervising engineer said, "Sorry, too late." Everyone kind of chuckled. He said, "No, really, it's too late." Bid denied, unopened.

ZORN REPLY/- imagine the public furor if this persnicketyness cost taxpayers $50 grand or so.

I live in Rogers Park & those of us have known for a very long time Moore is a phony!
A few years ago, he sneaked in to one of those bizarre omnibus bills that the city council loves the removal of a moratorium on new liquor licenses for Clark St. North of Devon. The moratorium was lifted just long enough for one license to get approved.
As you can guess, the licensee was a major financial contributor to Moore.
Moore apologized to the community, saying he had no idea people were opposed to ending the moratorium. But that's because he never asked. It was a year before the moratorium was reimposed [that's the minimum time by state law]].
Moore has taken other questionable contributions from people he's done favors for over the years, especially from a couple of slumlords.

The alderman he most reminds me of is Larry Bloom. Bloom was the "reformer" from Hyde Park who ended up in federal prison because under that costume of a reformer, was a typically corrupt Chicago alderman!

Two or three times in this exchange Ald. Moore blames Ald. Arena for not having his act together and EZ never even acknowledges that in any of his replies. Why didn't Arena do what he was supposed to? Ald. Moore appears to have put a fair amount of time and effort into his responses to Eric's continued questioning and I give him the win on this one.

ZORN REPLY -- Fair enough, and certainly Ald. Arena has the opportunity to reply here to that issue, though my understanding is that these aldermen thought the deadline was Friday until Wednesday night when they were informed otherwise. In either case, though, Arena was at Moore's office at least 10 minutes ahead of the deadline and Moore made no independent effort to see if the law required him to reject the filings as late or if this was simply an excessively rigid (and, I'd argue, extralegal) interpretation from the city's law department.
If the law had meant two business days, it would have said two business days. It didn't say that, so to conclude, somehow, that it did mean that is, as I say, difficult to defend legally. Especially in the Internet age.

--Maybe Joe Moore finally figured out that his "progressive" mask was no longer hiding his true identity, an old time Chicago politician with his hand out for another "campaign donation" and his eyes open for a better job than the one he isn't really working at now.

He was drooling all over Springfield trying to get appointed to head up the Illinois EPA so he could then lobby to have his wife take over as 49th ward alderman.

Nice work. I love your tenacity. That being said then, lets clear a few issues:

1. Having an elected school board vs. an apponted one is a good thing. Yes?
2. The intent to place a referendum on the ballot for an elected school board is still valid. Yes?
3. There is nothing that prevents this proposal from moving forward under other avenues and/or times. Yes?
4. Alderman Moore is a idiot (no reply necessary).

Now that these issues are "clear(er)", one item that I would like to know is simply this. What formula/criteria is used to determine how MANY teachers we are supposed to have? I'm guessing that that intel is based upon the most recent census data, but I cannot find it on the web. Can you provide assitance? Additionally, which city office is responsible for implementing the % of this number identified by criteria? That's the office that needs transparency.

Finally, what criteria is used to determine the size of the admin staff at CPS? I remember a Trib article a few months back that indicated a drop in CPS students (total) but an increase in total CPS spending due to increased CPS admin staff. Are we are paying more in taxation to pay CPS or to educate our children? That would be a good article for you to sink your teeth into.

My rule: someone who chooses politics as a career is corrupt (a crook, a power-monger or both) until proven otherwise.

At a lower level of politics, as in the Moore example, despite the B.S., typically, the cover is paper thin, the moves crude, the corruption is easier to see through (at least for those with IQ above room temperature). The higher the level, the smoother they get, less likely after material enrichment, more likely after power for its own sake.

I was at the Human relations Commitee meeting where Joe Moore pulled rank and gobbly gook in order to forbid discussion of putting the election of a Chicago Public School Board on the ballot.

First, the committee meeting did not begin exactly at 10:0 A.M., but I must admit that I was not carrying an atomic clock. Second, there was not even a quorum by 10:25 A.M., which is when I left the committee meeting room. Thus it would appear that there was the requisite 48 hour notice, when one does the numbers. Third, Alderman Moore went on and on about this issue of an elected school board not being in his committee's jurisdiction. I inferred that the alderman intended to remove the school board item from the agenda even if the other aldermen had gotten their petition in on time.

Since Joe Moore is my alderman, I went to his office 2 days later and dropped off my comments on an elected school board that I had been unable to voice at the committee meeting. One of his assistants told me that Alderman Moore would not take up the issue of an elected school board again because because it was not part of the Human Relations Committee's jurisdiction.

I pointed out to the gentleman that the next item on the agenda of that notorious meeting was to be a discussion of a proposed resolution of a US Constitutional Amendmend forbidding corporations and rich people from contributing to political campaigns. I told the assistant that I thought the Constitutional Amendment was non-germane, non-jurisdictional, and a touchy feelly pro-Democratic (with a big D) matter. I further stated that at least the discussion of an elected school board in a democratic forum (small d) by Chicago's citizens was much more relevant and germane than the Constitutional Amendment! The assistant shrugged his shoulders. Ironically, I am not opposed to most of the Constitutional Amendment resolution's sections, just to its irrelevance to Chicago's real problems.

I would score this anti-citizen, anti free-speech victory not to Joe Moore, but to the master manipulator Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who behind the scenes got Joe Moore to do his bidding.

Thanks for writing about this important aspect of City Hall transparency and our right to petition our City government.

“...the law department does routinely advise committee chairs to not include weekend days in their 48-hour counts.”

Finance committee chairman Burke routinely ignores this advice. Finance has a standing meeting at 10 AM on the Mondays in the week of the monthly 10 AM Wednesday full Council meetings, so timed so that the aldermen can make a pretense of complying the IL OMA required 48 hours before matters passing out of Finance can get on the full Council agenda.

We don't need to go back far to find interpretations of the notice requirement that differ from the hyper-literal. Hop on the Clerk's site and check out the Finance committee agenda for the meeting of 10 AM Monday June 4 2012.

Note that the agenda includes many issues that might reasonably be expected to attract public comment, including millions in settlements and tax incentives. Then note the time stamp of 10:26 AM Thursday May 31: more than 48 hours, but not without Saturday and Sunday.

Next check the minutes of that Finance committee meeting, and note the time stamp of 3:50 PM Monday June 4: less than 48 hours before the 10 AM Wednesday, with no complicating intervening weekend.

The same law department argues that the minutes of the various committees considered as a whole constitute a sort of virtual yet legal agenda for the full Council, yet this portion of the full Council agenda was not available 48 hours in advance.

Next check the full Council of June 6 and note that all Finance's items flew through, in apparent disregard for the City's corporate council and IL OMA.

Great article by Zorn and kudos to Hugh Devlin for additional egg on Moore's face research. The last thing this mayor wants is citizen involvement, especially in the schools. I recall some post election comments of his to the effect of "You elected me so get out of my way since you gave me the mandate to do whatever I want." If the ERSB idea gets popular then people might start asking renewed questions about why we got such an unqualified loser as CPS CEO. Why did Rahm bring him here after his ejection from Rochester by parents, teachers and an elected school board? That's another story Rahm really wants Chicago to forget about. http://www.13wham.com/content/blogs/story/Chicago-Heres-Your-Guide-to-Brizard/rxoMgQsKCE6_A7XmVviXbg.cspx Brizard's future looks bleak going from a two time 95% non binding disapproval vote by teachers at his first job to a 98% strike authorization vote at the next one. And yes, it's 98% when you put aside the anti democratic non vote counting as a no vote obscenity that is SB 7.

I like how Joe comes out and says, "A successful democracy requires transparency. " He has NOT been transparent about the fact that the Mayor had a private fundraising event for him a few days before this all happened. Good at talking the talk, but now walking the walk. Just like his nomination for Illinois EPA got quashed, Joe has been trying to climb the political ladder for 20 years and hasn't much luck, too bad the once Heartland of Independent progressives (49th) is left to someone who doesn't want the job.

About "Change of Subject."

"Change of Subject" by Chicago Tribune op-ed columnist Eric Zorn contains observations, reports, tips, referrals and tirades, though not necessarily in that order. Links will tend to expire, so seize the day. For an archive of Zorn's latest Tribune columns click here. An explanation of the title of this blog is here. If you have other questions, suggestions or comments, send e-mail to ericzorn at gmail.com.
More about Eric Zorn

Contributing editor Jessica Reynolds is a 2012 graduate of Loyola University Chicago and is the coordinator of the Tribune's editorial board. She can be reached at jreynolds at tribune.com.